ASCAP War On Free Culture Escalates 335
An anonymous reader writes "After ASCAP declared war on free culture and Creative Commons responded on the incident, the war of words is escalating. Drew Wilson of ZeroPaid has been following this story closely. The EFF responded to the ASCAP letter, saying 'we don't think that ASCAP characterized EFF and its work accurately. We believe that artists should be compensated for their work, and one proposal we have for that is Voluntary Collective Licensing.' The response from the EFF came with a study and a letter written by one irate ASCAP member who donated to the EFF and to Public Knowledge as a result of the ASCAP letter. Public Knowledge also responded to the letter, saying, 'It's obvious that the characterization of Public Knowledge is false. Public Knowledge advocates for balanced copyright and an open Internet the empowers creators and the public. What we oppose are overreaching policies proposed by large corporate copyright holders that punish lawful users of technology and copyrighted works.' Now the National Music Publishers Association has weighed in to support ASCAP, saying that organizations like Public Knowledge and the EFF 'have an extremist radical anti-copyright agenda,' according to a transcript of a speech posted on Billboard. Public Knowledge has dismissed those allegations, saying 'anybody who has spent more than five minutes on our website or talking to our staff knows that these things are not true.'"
Re:ASCAP is (Score:5, Informative)
No, it's easier than that.
AS = Ass.
CAP = Hat.
They're just a bunch of asshats. I don't think there is an actual composer or author left in the group; ASCAP years ago drove anyone with any common sense into either individual publishing and licensing, or the arms of rival groups.
I mean seriously. These are the same group of dickfaces who tried to sue 5-year-olds for singing songs at summer camp. [steinski.com] No joke.
Helpful Links (Score:3, Informative)
Support the EFF: http://www.eff.org/helpout [eff.org]
Support Creative Commons: https://support.creativecommons.org/ [creativecommons.org]
David Bollier (Score:5, Informative)
I mean seriously. These are the same group of dickfaces who tried to sue 5-year-olds for singing songs at summer camp. [steinski.com] No joke.
For those who are not going to click the link, the material referenced there is from David Bollier [bollier.org]'s book "Brand Name Bullies".
That is still on my bookshelf, but I can highly recommend Bollier's work [bollier.org] generally, as a promotion of the concept of a "commons" - "Silent Theft" being a prime example, or, for those who prefer shorter reading matter, Bollier's paper, which gave rise to the book, "Public Assets, Private Profits" [bollier.org].
(As a lawyer with a keen interest in this area, I'm a big fan of David's work, and his easy-to-access writing style.)
There goes a donation to the EFF (Score:3, Informative)
They should find a better use for my money than the music industry.
Here's the EFF donation [eff.org] page, for those who'd want to contribute as well.
Re:Extremism (Score:3, Informative)
Up here in Canada, we've got a new copyright bill [michaelgeist.ca] coming down the pike. It's been spearheaded by two Cabinet ministers, Tony Clement (Industry) and James Moore (Canadian Heritage). While Clement has been sensitive and seems open to suggestions [michaelgeist.ca], Moore has definitely taken a more combative approach.
In fact, in a recent speech, Moore decried copyright "radical extremists [www.cbc.ca]" with a "babyish" attitude toward copyright.
Notice the same phrase?
Re:Radical extremists? (Score:3, Informative)
Since when is it considered illegal for me to give away my own content, if I chose to do so?
It isn't. ASCAP's position is that it should be.
John Perry Barlow (Score:5, Informative)
Some of the older Slashdotters here may remember, but one of the founding members of the EFF was John Perry Barlow, who is intimately associated with the Grateful Dead, having collaborated as a lyricist, primarily as a partner with Bob Weir (Garcia tended to collaborate with a poet named Robert Hunter). The reason this is relevant is because the Dead is perhaps one of the best examples of the model that "free culture" advocates promote. The band pretty much encouraged bootlegging of concerts, sometimes even letting the occasional fan tap into the mixing board. There are millions of bootlegged recordings available, yet they still sell tonnes of records. More importantly, they were a huge concert draw and one of the biggest touring acts prior to Garcia's death. The spin-off bands with the remaining members, such as Dark Star and Rat Dog continue to go pretty strong, as do bands who were culturally influenced by them, and not just musically influenced, such as Phish.
While EFF is probably more famous around here for providing defense funds for MOD hackers in the late 80s and early 90s, outting NSA wiretapping programs, and stuff like that I think it really is kind of important to remember that from their founding, they were probably the most qualified organization to take a stand on this particular issue.
Why won't ASCAP or BMI people show themselves? (Score:5, Informative)
I'm a musician, one of the people ASCAP claims to be helping. I don't feel helped. ASCAP and BMI shakedown establishments who hire live music. Either they pay this extortion or no cover tunes can be played there. If you post your rendition of a cover tune online to promote your fledgling local band, you may be sued or extorted. Sure makes it more difficult to get a band off the ground.
I despise these sons of bitches and I'm sure I'm not alone. I also think ASCAP and BMI people are aware that their policies and activities make them unpopular. I've never seen or heard anyone who identifies themselves with ASCAP. I understand why.
Re:Personally, I do have a radical agenda (Score:3, Informative)
That's unrelated to ASCAP. ASCAP does not have any part in negotiating synchronization rights. Those are negotiated individually between the composer, the publisher, and the company wanting to do the synchronization. All ASCAP can do in the matter is provide contact information for the publisher and composer.
The problem is not unusual. Most TV shows don't pre-license the rights for subsequent DVD release, and when they decide they want to do so, the publishers feel like they have them over a barrel, and try to extort as much as they can out of them. Ultimately, this is all caused by the short-sightedness of the TV show producers not getting the license agreements in place up front. Had they done so, they might have chosen different music in some cases, but they would not have needed to change things between broadcast and DVD release.
Re:Ha. (Score:3, Informative)
ASCAP doesn't really have a horse in that race. They don't represent composers or publishers in licensing of mechanical rights.... If they are expressing an opinion at all, they're kind of exceeding their bounds. Either way, they are not a party to such transactions, making their leadership's opinions largely if not wholly irrelevant.
"Radical extremist" (Score:3, Informative)
No, that wasn't a misquote from the NMPA, that's a quote from Canada's Heritage Minister James Moore [www.cbc.ca] in response to reasoned opposition to his Bill C-32, which introduces DMCA-style IP laws, labelling any opposed to it or in favour of a more balanced approach, like Michael Geist, as "radical extremists."
Unsurprisingly, these inflammatory words come from the ruling party which takes as many pages from the neo-conservative playbook as they can.
The phrasing is so similar that Moore should sue the NMPA for willful copyright infringement.
Re:Why won't ASCAP or BMI people show themselves? (Score:5, Informative)
This is exactly the problem. If you're an ASCAP member, but aren't getting air time on the radio you'll see little to nothing from them. ASCAP shakes down every establishment that has live music for a license fee to make sure that their members get paid for "your use of their material to enhance your business."
But if you're a member with a local following, playing your own stuff in a venue that has paid up. You won't see any money from them because your not being broadcast, or selling a significant number of CD's or downloads from the legal channels. As that is how they determine the distribution of the money from these fees.
Re:wrong product and/or wrong line of work (Score:1, Informative)
Don't make a up a word when a perfectly good one is available.
Corporatocracy == Fascism. Plain and simple.
The U.S.A. is definitely a fascist state. It seems that a large part of my tax dollars are used to economic development; either I'm building a new "world" headquarters for a company that offshores its manufacturing or building a new stadium for the local sports franchise, who pay little in the way of taxes. Single-payer healthcare? Not if it offends health insurers. Drug coverage? Only if we agree to pay full retail price and never negotiate. Mickey needs a copyright extension, not a problem.
And the trains don't even run on time.
Re:Radical extremists? (Score:1, Informative)
Bwah. As a European, I can assure you that all of your media is scarily right-wing.
Here in Europe, we have left (social democrat), center (liberal) and right (conservative) media. You have only conservative, with maybe a hind of liberal here and there.
Re:wrong product and/or wrong line of work (Score:2, Informative)
The line between the government and the corporation has been blurred.
In fact, every time something like this happens we scramble to find that line, and it's nowhere to be found.
And some of us can scarcely remember what it looked like.
What we have now is a global Corporatocracy, the compromise between government and corporation.
What have the compromised? Our rights.
If we don't fight ACTA, our grandchildren will have no idea that a line ever existed at all.
And as I've found, if you boldface random words in your rants, you will be taken more seriously, and won't at all sound like a religious tract or a brochure from the crazy guy down on the corner telling people about the end times.
Re:ASCAP is (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Personally, I do have a radical agenda (Score:3, Informative)
Well, I've got to concede the movie stuff to you - frankly, the studio system is insane.
I'm afraid you're wrong about the publishing, though. The price of distribution isn't actually that high - generally, it's placed in the hands of a wholesaler such as Ingram (that's how I get the distribution for the books my company publishes). And, particularly when you're dealing with large print runs, the printing cost per book is pretty low.
(For that matter, in a lot of cases, most of the costs of the book occur before the book goes to the printer, as far as I can tell.)
As far as internal advocates go, that's not really the way it works either. In the publishing companies I've worked with (Osborne/McGraw-Hill and Pocket Books), there is an acquisitions editor who is basically a gatekeeper, making sure that only the best possible books get in (in theory). Then, those books the gatekeeper lets past are reviewed by an editor, or sometimes a committee, to see if they're a good investment. Having a contact on the inside can be helpful at times, but the actual system in general tends to judge somebody based on their writing skill more than their contacts.
(Although, for the life of me, I cannot explain how Terry Goodkind got through. I wish I could, but I can't.)
Re:Why won't ASCAP or BMI people show themselves? (Score:3, Informative)
Which means that ASCAP only has to pay out to performers who are *already* making enough money to hire lawyers to threaten ASCAP if said performer doesn't get paid in a timely manner.
It follows that all the performers who aren't rich exist only to indirectly fund ASCAP.